


A Steady Flame

by scribblemyname



Category: Avatar: The Last Airbender
Genre: Established Relationship, F/M, Post-Canon
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-08-18
Updated: 2019-08-18
Packaged: 2020-08-14 10:49:04
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,122
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20191042
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/scribblemyname/pseuds/scribblemyname
Summary: She slipped through the room like water, like grace. She ought to be a flame burning bright, but somehow she was steady and soothing instead. She took his face in one hand and read him carefully. She didn't always see through him, despite having known him forever, but he could see the telltale tightening of her expression that said she did this time.





	A Steady Flame

**Author's Note:**

  * For [silveradept](https://archiveofourown.org/users/silveradept/gifts).

There was something wholly different about coming _home_ and realizing he had to be a different person and make a new start _here._ It seemed easier to be someone other than himself when he was no longer Prince Zuko but rather living in the Earth Kingdom, under a different name, or with the Avatar without the title.

Here though, everything was familiar. Old lessons haunted him. And Uncle Iroh was happily serving tea in the Earth Kingdom instead of being there with Zuko, reminding him he didn't have to listen to the old voices in his head, telling him about honor, fear, and the traditions of the Fire Nation.

"You look pensive," a soft voice broke through the shadows behind him.

He glanced up, surprised. He hadn't even noticed it growing dark as he stared out at his mother's gardens from the balcony, hadn't realized Mai was still here in the palace. "Just thinking," he said and forced a smile to his face for her sake. No need to tell her he felt like he didn't belong here and would never be a good Firelord, or rather, that he belonged here too well and might still never be a good Firelord.

She slipped through the room like water, like grace. She ought to be a flame burning bright, but somehow she was steady and soothing instead. She took his face in one hand and read him carefully. She didn't always see through him, despite having known him forever, but he could see the telltale tightening of her expression that said she did this time.

For a moment, Mai didn't say anything more. She slid her hand to his shoulder and leaned against him with a quiet sigh. It felt too natural to slide his arm around her and take comfort from the warmth of her against him.

"You miss them all, don't you?" she said at last.

"Them?" Their faces flooded through his mind. Aang with his all too frequent goofy ease even in the face of impending battle. Sokka who took his position so seriously. Katara, the wisest and bitterest but also the sweetest. Bold, brash Toph with a surprising soft center she almost never let the rock walls down to uncover. Yes, he missed them. "I miss uncle," he said aloud. "He's so wise and I..." But he trailed off, uncertain what to say.

"Hey." Mai knocked his chin gently with her head, not really moving from her position. "You're going to do fine."

"I'm—" Zuko was Ozai's son and Azula's brother, and all his training in how to rule had come from a despot.

Mai made a soft, hushing sound.

He held her close and tried to remember he was also Ursa's son and Iroh's nephew. Surely that had to count for something.

* * *

Mai was good at putting on the formal wear and attitude of a Fire Lady—not that he'd officially made her that yet since even the idea of proposing still tied his stomach in knots, but he'd thought about it. Everyone had.

She did haughty, bored, or terrifying in the approved polite manner of Fire Nation nobility with frightening ease while attaching herself to Zuko's side in the perfect balance between overt intimacy and impeccable polite distance. It wasn't until Ty Lee pointed it out though that he realized how she'd used that position to forcibly guard him from most of the social ingratiating that went on in the court. Because who would want to ingratiate themselves with him?

Afterwards, he thought about how to address it, but confronting a girl—woman rather—about running other women off her territory wasn't exactly among the skills Ozai or Iroh had thought important to teach the next Fire Lord.

"Mai?" He got that far before noticing she was combing out her hair as she looked up in question.

At his vanity. In his room.

The gossip was going to be terrible if she didn't put it up the exact same way before she left.

"Uh, Mai?" Her hair was also very pretty down.

She sighed as if she could tell exactly what had fizzed out his brain and tucked up her hair in its usual style, then looked up at him and answered with exaggerated patience. "Yes, Zuko?"

"You know you don't have to do that," he finally managed. "I'm not interested in anyone else's daughters." However eligible they were or suggested to be.

Mai sniffed. "You've broken up with me three times. I'm making sure you don't do it again."

"Wait, what? You broke up with _me_ two of those times!"

"Because you didn't know what you wanted, or you didn't treat me right because you were mad and scared about something completely unrelated," Mai countered. "Which is also why you wrote me that letter and ended up at Boiling Rock."

"I didn't want to drag you into it!"

Mai looked daggers at him. "Has it once occurred to you that I _want_ to be dragged into it?"

Zuko shut up, stared at her wide-eyed. No. No, it had not.

Mai set the comb down on the vanity and stood. "Your sister never had trouble dragging me into things." And it had always been a relief of boredom, in addition to whatever threat there was of retribution for rejected friendship. "I'm still here, Zuko."

Through rejecting his father, _deposing_ his father, leaving her for the Avatar, coming back over and over even when he didn't even know what to believe or think or choose, she was right. She was still here.

"I'm sorry," he said. "I never meant to put you through all my..." There wasn't even a word for his brand of slow learning.

Mai's face softened. She slipped forward and tucked herself against him the way she had when he finally arrived home, when he was worried most about being a terrible Fire Lord, when they'd had those moments of reprieve from being royal at the beach. "While we're on the topic," she said lightly, "I think we should get married so I can stop worrying about the court ladies getting their claws in you."

He wanted to protest her getting to the question first but he just sighed and kissed the top of her head. "Maybe."

"Maybe?" A hint of displeasure edged her voice.

"I'm just saying maybe we should think about it first?"

She pulled back and shot him a narrow-eyed look. "I've been thinking about it for ten years."

Zuko stared at her, his whole body tense with the idea of that. "Oh."

Well, put that way, "Are you sure you can put up with me?"

"I'll manage," Mai answered, then smiled softly.

* * *

And in the end, they did manage very well.


End file.
